Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Epigenetics
1:49 PM | 
Posted by
Kaplan Center for Health and Wellness
If you have been following this blog, then you know that I have a deep interest in how food affects health. This interest has led me down many paths, one of which is exploring the field of epigenetics.
Epigenetics is the study of how our genome responds to our environment. Environment includes things such as what we eat, our stress levels, our behaviors (like smoking), and environmental toxins (such as BPA). In a nutshell, the epigenome is a set of chemical tags that sit on top of the genome and affect how genes are expressed. In other words, the epigenome influences whether genes will be “on or off” – this in turn affects how our cells function. Essentially, epigenetics confirms what we have known all along: What we eat and what we do affects our health.
Check out this video from Genetic Science Learning Center, University of Utah, http://learn.genetics.utah.edu to see how it works:
Stay tuned for details on diet and the epigenome…
Nancy Silva, ND
Faculty, Health Science Dept
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